BitTorrent man jailed for five months

A US man has been jailed for five months and sentenced to a further five months of home detention for his role as a leading participant in the BitTorrent tracker site Elitetorrents.

US District Court Judge James P Jones also sentenced Grant T Stanley, 23 of Wise in Virginia, to a $3,000 fine and three years supervised release.

Stanley previously pleaded to "conspiracy to commit copyright infringement" and "criminal copyright infringement" violations of the Family Entertainment Copyright Act. The 23-year-old is one of three defendants convicted following an FBI orchestrated enforcement action dubbed Operation D-Elite that saw the closure of Elitetorrents and a number of arrests in May 2006.

Another defendant, Scott McCausland, pleaded guilty to similar offences in the same crimes two months ago and is due to face a sentencing hearing on 14 December. McCausland is asking supporters to write a letter to the judge ahead of this hearing, Torrentfreakreports.

EliteTorrents was singled out for enforcement action because it published a tracker for Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith hours before the theatrical release of the film. This prompted the MPAA, which monitors BitTorrent sites, into pressuring the FBI to take enforcement action. ®